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Introduction: From Autonomy to Symbolization Failure

Boğaziçi University – long celebrated as one of Turkey’s most autonomous and reputable academic institutions – has experienced an unprecedented institutional, cultural, and academic collapse since 2021. This report examines how the post-2021 interventions at Boğaziçi led to what observers call a “symbolization failure” (sembolizasyon arızası), wherein the university’s symbols of academic freedom, rational governance, and community solidarity have been systematically degraded. We analyze concrete developments – administrative takeovers, infrastructural breakdowns, symbolic acts of violence, and erosion of self-governance – to understand how Boğaziçi’s physical, psychological, and symbolic fabric unraveled. Crucially, emotional narratives are set aside in favor of verifiable facts from official statements, journalism, and academic commentary in both Turkish and English. The picture that emerges is one of irrational decision-making by a politicized rectorate, in which academic representation and productivity were sacrificed for visibility and control. As we will explore, faculty and students mounted vigorous protests and creative resistance (#DirenBoğaziçi), yet these efforts failed to coalesce into structural change – instead drifting into performative displays of empathy and aestheticized dissent. Attempts to form a lasting “commune” of resistance faltered amid fatigue, internal divisions, and the overpowering influence of digital activism detached from on-the-ground organization. Over more than 1000 days of continuous academic vigil, the protest itself became unintelligible, a ritual ignored by those in power. Meanwhile, the symbolic framing of respected figures – outspoken professors like Prof. Dr. Tuna Tuğcu and Prof. Dr. Cem Say – did not galvanize a unified collective subject; on the contrary, these figures were marginalized and even smeared, illustrating the failure of symbols to rally a community under siege.

In the final analysis, Boğaziçi’s crisis reflects a broader malaise in which the value of the university as an institution is called into question in the age of AI. As traditional academic governance dissolves into image-centric management and knowledge production is devalued, one must ask: what is the validity of a university degree when the institution itself has been hollowed out? The report concludes by acknowledging a poignant irony – that as human institutions dissolve, even a comprehensive report like this is generated by an AI. “As institutions dissolve, reports are no longer written by people, but by machines.”

The End of Academic Autonomy: Top-Down Appointments and Governance Seizure

For decades, Boğaziçi University enjoyed a reputation for democratic governance and de facto autonomy in Turkish academia. This autonomy effectively ended in 2021 with a series of top-down appointments of university leadership by central government decree. On January 1, 2021, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan appointed an outside rector, Prof. Melih Bulu, bypassing the university’s tradition of electing its own rector. This intervention – the first time since the 1980 military coup that Boğaziçi had a rector imposed from outside – shattered the norm of self-governance and was widely seen as a political takeover. Students and faculty immediately protested the loss of autonomy: thousands rallied on campus and were met with riot police, who symbolically handcuffed the campus gates to keep protesters out. The image of locked gates shared on social media became emblematic of the new era: a once-open campus literally barred and chained by state power.

The resistance to Bulu’s appointment was intense and sustained. Faculty members – donning their academic robes – began a daily “academic vigil” on January 5, 2021, standing with their backs turned to the Rector’s office to signify non-recognition of the appointed authority. Students organized creative protests, from dancing to heavy metal music (“Master of Puppets”) in front of the Rectorate to staging outdoor art installations, all under the hashtag #KabulEtmiyoruzVazgeçmiyoruz (“We do not accept, we do not give up”). Despite these efforts, state authorities doubled down: over 600 students were detained in the first months, and Istanbul’s governor issued blanket bans on demonstrations near the campus. In July 2021, Melih Bulu was abruptly removed by Erdoğan – not to restore autonomy, but seemingly due to a separate issue (an alleged plagiarism finding) and to quell public criticism. The relief was short-lived. In August 2021, Erdoğan appointed Prof. Mehmet Naci İnci as the new rector, despite İnci having received a 95% no-confidence vote from Boğaziçi faculty. This made clear that electoral legitimacy was no longer relevant; the pattern of appointed “kayyum” rectors (a term meaning trustee or caretaker, used pejoratively for imposed administrators) would continue.

Under Naci İnci’s tenure, the wholesale erosion of internal governance structures accelerated. Boğaziçi’s tradition of participatory decision-making – where deans, department chairs, and directors were typically chosen by faculty committees – was effectively dismantled. By 2022, across virtually all faculties and units, elected academic administrators were removed and replaced by rectoral appointments. Even department chairs elected according to university statutes were summarily dismissed; in multiple cases, Prof. İnci simply installed his preferred candidates, often from outside the Boğaziçi community. These purges continued into 2023 and 2024, indicating a sustained policy of centralizing authority in the rectorate at the expense of academic self-governance. As many as 100 new faculty members were hired outside of normal academic hiring protocols – essentially “parachuted” in without input from departments. An investigative report in early 2024 tallied that over 70 “parachute academics” had been appointed to Boğaziçi since the takeover, bypassing the usual search and vetting processes that require departmental consultation. Previously, Boğaziçi faculty recruitment involved candidates giving research seminars in English and departments voting on appointments in a transparent, merit-based manner. Under the new regime, those collegial practices were scrapped in favor of top-down selection – a stark indicator that academic meritocracy was being replaced by loyalty to the appointed administration.

The end of de facto autonomy at Boğaziçi is thus marked by direct political intervention and an administrative coup within the university. The rectorate, armed with extensive powers under Turkey’s Higher Education Law, exercised those powers to an unprecedented degree, in a way Boğaziçi’s consensual culture had never witnessed. This governance collapse provides the backdrop for all subsequent crises: with institutional checks removed, the rectorate’s decisions – no matter how irrational or damaging – faced little internal resistance beyond protests. Boğaziçi became a cautionary tale of how swiftly a proud academic institution could be seized and repurposed under an authoritarian approach to higher education governance.

Technical Disruptions and Infrastructural Mismanagement

The collapse of academic norms at Boğaziçi was accompanied by severe technical and infrastructural disruptions that undermined daily functioning and trust in the university’s systems. Under the appointed administration, information technology infrastructure and campus services suffered from erratic decision-making. One of the most jarring examples was the abrupt change of Boğaziçi’s longstanding internet domain name – a seemingly technical move with wide-ranging consequences. In late January 2024, the rectorate announced that the university’s web and email addresses, historically using the “boun.edu.tr” domain (in place since 1993), would be switched to “bogazici.edu.tr” effective February 1, 2024. Academics reacted with alarm, noting that they had used “@boun.edu.tr” emails in all scholarly communications and publications for decades. “We do not understand what benefit this change has – thousands of users will suffer difficulties because of it,” said Prof. Dr. Cem Say, Chair of the Computer Engineering department. Prof. Dr. Tuna Tuğcu likewise criticized the move as an attempt to “create a completely new Boğaziçi” by erasing the university’s established digital identity – “This is denying and destroying the entire accumulation of the university in an effort to create a ‘M. Naci İnci Boğaziçi University’”. Indeed, changing the domain meant potential loss of access to archives, broken links to research outputs, and confusion in corresponding with collaborators worldwide. Many saw it as a technocratic caprice with symbolic overtones: a bid to remake Boğaziçi’s brand while complicating the lives of its scholars. By prioritizing image (the full “bogazici” name) over practical function, the rectorate signaled that visibility mattered more than the productivity or convenience of its academic community.

Perhaps even more damaging was a major data security scandal in 2022 that shook trust in the university’s information systems. On June 10, 2022, four professors serving on Boğaziçi’s Information Technologies Council blew the whistle on a gross violation of data protection norms. They revealed that the personal data of over 60,000 members of the Boğaziçi community – including students, faculty, staff, and alumni – had been left exposed and possibly accessed without authorization, in breach of Turkey’s data protection laws and the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Subsequent investigative reporting uncovered the root of the problem: Boğaziçi’s new IT Department head, Faruk Yakaryılmaz, had allegedly given broad access to the university’s databases to unauthorized individuals. Even more startling, it emerged that Yakaryılmaz was a former police official implicated in a 2014 bribery investigation – he had been brought in from Üsküdar Municipality and installed as Boğaziçi’s IT Director, despite having been detained years earlier in a corruption sting. In other words, someone with a checkered background was put in charge of sensitive data, and he in turn allowed improper data access, threatening privacy and security on campus. When the independent news site Diken reported these facts under the headline “Director suspected of bribe who exposed Boğaziçi members’ information” (“Boğaziçililerin bilgilerini erişime açan rüşvet şüphelisi müdür”), the Boğaziçi rectorate moved to censor the news. At the rector’s request, an Istanbul court issued a gag order in June 2022 to take down the report, which had been written by investigative journalist Canan Coşkun. The attempt to bury the story only underscored its severity. Eventually, details still spread: Yakaryılmaz had been arrested on January 10, 2014 in a high-profile graft operation (“İmbat Wave”) and was now enabling surveillance at Boğaziçi by granting four academic personnel privileged access to personal data. The implication of political policing on campus was clear – the data leak scandal showed that digital infrastructure was being co-opted to monitor or control the university community, in violation of ethical and legal standards.

The fallout from the data scandal was immediate. The four Boğaziçi professors who had exposed the violation faced swift reprisals from the rectorate. They were hit with administrative punishments: suspended from campus, targeted by lawsuits, and even threatened with permanent expulsion from public service. One of them, Prof. Tuna Tuğcu, was suspended multiple times in 2022 on unclear grounds – “no clear justification” was given for his three-month bans from duty, which he successfully challenged in court. Tuğcu disclosed that Rector İnci had formally requested his dismissal from public service entirely, an extraordinary step aimed at ending the career of a tenured professor who had simply reported a data breach. Such retaliation sent a chilling message to other staff: technical mismanagement, even of a potentially unlawful nature, could not be safely questioned. The loss of trust in institutional infrastructure was twofold – not only were Boğaziçi’s networks compromised under dubious leadership, but the administration actively silenced those trying to uphold integrity. By late 2022, even routine IT matters turned contentious. The rectorate abruptly announced a tender to move the university’s servers off-campus, presumably outsourcing data hosting. This plan (revealed via a T24 news report) fueled concerns that Boğaziçi’s digital assets would be placed under external control, further eroding oversight by its own academic committees. In sum, Boğaziçi’s new management demonstrated a pattern of opaque and erratic IT governance – from domain names to data leaks – that amounted to technical sabotage of the university’s day-to-day operations and long-term credibility.

Symbolic Violence on Campus: Manure on the Green and Militarization

Beyond administrative decrees and IT miscues, the appointed management also enacted symbolic and physical affronts to the campus environment. These acts carried a heavy psychological weight, as they appeared aimed at humiliating and demoralizing the Boğaziçi community. Perhaps the most bizarre and telling incident was when the rectorate dumped animal manure on the university’s iconic lawn – the very ground where academics held their daily protest vigil. In late March 2025, professors arriving for their noontime “back-turning” protest found that workers, acting on rectorate orders, had spread pungent animal fertilizer across the grassy square in front of the Rector’s building. The area was cordoned off with tape, and the staff performing the dumping taunted the gathered faculty: “You can step inside the taped area if you want,” implying the professors were welcome to stand in the filth. This astonishing display of contempt immediately drew outrage. Prof. Dr. Tuna Tuğcu lambasted the rector on social media, asking: “Have you become this petty? After 4.5 years, do you think you can stop the Academic Vigil by manuring the square?”. He pointed out the absurdity and symbolic insult of the act: “You don’t fertilize a lawn with animal manure – lawn fertilizer is different. In this season you use 20-5-10 fertilizer with ample watering. M. Naci İnci doesn’t know how to run a university, just as he doesn’t know how to fertilize”. Indeed, agricultural experts would agree dumping raw manure on a tended lawn is not standard practice – it was meant to soil the space literally and figuratively. The faculty realized the administration’s ploy: they suspected the rector hoped to photograph the academics “standing in filth” to degrade their image. Boğaziçi professors refused to oblige; they ended that day’s vigil early, quipping that “now the rector himself can sit in the stink he created”. The manure was eventually cleaned, but the stain on the institution’s dignity could not be so easily washed away. In a statement to the press, academics called such actions “basitlik” (trivial baseness) and warned it would be the legacy of this administration – “These petty acts always backfire…and this pettiness is what you’ll be remembered for!”. The symbolic violence of dumping manure on a protest site speaks volumes: it was a deliberate show of disdain for academic protest and an attempt to reduce a hallowed space of learning into a site of literal excrement. This extreme measure exemplified how far the symbolic degradation went, reflecting a deep hostility toward the university’s representational value (its prestige, traditions, and public standing).

[*] Boğaziçi’s iconic South Campus lawn taped off after workers, allegedly on rectorate orders, dumped animal manure where faculty held their daily protest (March 2025). This act of symbolic degradation exemplified the appointed administration’s disdain for academic dissent.

Parallel to these offensive gestures, the physical militarization of the campus has intensified since 2021, turning the once-open university into a fortified zone. Immediately after Melih Bulu’s appointment, armed police units and surveillance apparatus became a fixture of Boğaziçi life. Police trucks and barricades encircled the university gates during protests, and this security presence never fully abated even in calmer periods. Over time, the rectorate installed hundreds of new security cameras across campus, and both private security guards and plainclothes police patrol university buildings regularly. By 2023, Boğaziçi’s campuses were described as “residence for private security and civilian police”, with high metal fences erected (notably on South Campus by May 2021) to control entry and prevent gatherings. Press access was also severely restricted – after mid-2021, journalists were barred from entering to cover events on campus. The administration even used administrative edicts to bar specific groups from campus, undercutting the idea of the university as a public space. More than 100 individuals – including prominent alumni, retired professors, and even current faculty on leave – were put on a blacklist and denied entry. In one striking move in 2023, all emeritus professors and retired faculty not actively teaching were banned from campus by the rector’s order. This bizarre policy not only severed ties with the university’s institutional memory but also depopulated the campus of many senior scholars who often mentored students or engaged in research informally. By mid-2024, the securitization had reached a point where even members of the Turkish Parliament were blocked from attending events at Boğaziçi – a parliamentarian was prevented from entering campus for a graduation ceremony, underscoring the administration’s willingness to flout protocol and isolate the university from any external scrutiny.

The overall effect of these measures – from manure dumping to heavy policing – has been a climate of intimidation and disrespect. Students and faculty describe a palpable psychological hardship: the feeling of studying and working under occupation. The campus atmosphere that once encouraged open-air debates and student assemblies is now surveilled and suppressed. The green spaces themselves became contested symbols – the lawn incident showed the administration would literally foul the environment to assert dominance. In cultural terms, these acts signified a disdain for academia’s symbols and constituents. By trampling on both the physical commons (the lawn, the gates) and the human commons (the community and its veterans), the Boğaziçi rectorate demonstrated an alarming irrationality underpinning its decisions: a willingness to inflict harm with no benefit, seemingly out of spite or a desire to display unchallenged authority. This aligns with the notion of “symbolization failure” – the inability of the administration to maintain any pretense of respect for the university’s symbolic order, instead resorting to crude displays of power that ultimately backfired in meaning. Each such act eroded the shared understanding of what Boğaziçi stood for, plunging the community deeper into a sense of estrangement and crisis.

Scandals and Breaches of Trust: Data Leaks, Censorship and Loss of Confidence

The technical mismanagement and hostile campus environment gave rise to scandals that fundamentally undermined trust in Boğaziçi’s institutional integrity. Foremost among these was the aforementioned data leak scandal, which had multiple layers of breach: not only of data security but also of ethics and law. When Boğaziçi’s own academics revealed that personal information of tens of thousands had been mishandled, they expected accountability or at least an investigation. Instead, the response was to silence the messengers and obscure the truth, confirming the worst fears about the new regime’s opacity. The details are stark: the IT Director, Faruk Yakaryılmaz – a figure with a murky past – had been granting access to the university’s internal databases to certain individuals without oversight. It later emerged that these accesses allowed monitoring of private data, possibly in an effort to identify or intimidate participants in the protests. The four members of the IT Council who exposed this (including Prof. Tuğcu and colleagues) followed proper channels initially, raising concerns within the university. Only when ignored did they turn to external whistleblowing. The Boğaziçi administration’s urgent resort to court censorship of the news report, and the subsequent punitive action against the four academics, sent a clear message: loyalty to the rectorate’s agenda trumped any norms of transparency, legality, or community welfare. This was a severe breach of trust – students and staff could no longer be sure that their personal data (emails, grades, ID info, etc.) wasn’t being misused or that those protecting their rights wouldn’t be punished.

Moreover, the culture of bureaucratic opacity extended beyond the data incident. Repeatedly, decisions with serious ramifications were taken with zero consultation and scant explanation. For instance, when research centers were shut down or evicted (as detailed in the next section), center directors and faculty found out only after the fact – keys were changed overnight and offices found emptied without any prior notice or stated justification. The rectorate’s communications about such moves were either evasive or nonexistent. Even faculty senate members reported being left in the dark about major changes in academic programs, hiring, and infrastructure.

Another realm where trust suffered was in academic honesty and ethical standards. Boğaziçi University’s scholarly reputation was tarnished by multiple plagiarism controversies under the appointed regime. Ironically, the very first appointee, Rector Melih Bulu, was widely accused (and later officially found) to have plagiarized significant portions of his doctoral dissertation. A group of Boğaziçi alumni with expertise in research ethics systematically analyzed Bulu’s PhD and master’s theses, uncovering extensive copy-paste sections and even plagiarism at the core hypothesis of the work. They submitted a detailed report to the Higher Education Council (YÖK), which reportedly confirmed that Bulu’s plagiarism was serious enough to constitute an impediment to his duties. It is widely believed that this finding contributed to Bulu’s removal in July 2021 (although not officially stated). His short tenure thus ended with the implicit admission that Boğaziçi’s rector had committed academic fraud, a travesty for an institution that prides itself on scholarly excellence. Yet the pattern did not stop there. Bulu’s hand-picked General Secretary, Dr. Nedim Malkoç, also had plagiarism allegations surface regarding his academic work. And in 2022, Boğaziçi alumni exposed that the newly appointed Dean of the Economics and Administrative Sciences Faculty, Prof. Dr. Murat Önder, had plagiarized large sections of his PhD dissertation. In a comprehensive analysis, they highlighted “block quotations presented without citation, sources missing from the bibliography, and extensive verbatim copying” in Önder’s thesis. This was not a minor oversight – the plagiarism pervaded from the introduction to the conclusion, even bizarrely appearing in the acknowledgements section. The alumni group forwarded their findings to YÖK, the Inter-University Council, Prof. Önder’s original university (Florida State University), and Boğaziçi’s own administration. Their statement underscored the principle at stake: “Academic merit is built on original work, scientific competence, and ethics. A dean whose degree is tainted by plagiarism must face accountability.”. Despite this, Prof. Önder remained in his position for some time, and Boğaziçi’s leadership did not immediately act – once again choosing to sweep a serious ethical breach under the rug. It was only through external pressure and embarrassment that any steps might be taken (the outcome of the inquiry has not been transparently shared as of this writing).

These plagiarism scandals tie into the concept of “symbolization failure” as well: the traditional symbols of academic achievement – a PhD, a faculty title – were hollowed out when it turned out that those elevated by the new regime had not earned their honors honestly. The inability of these titles to represent true merit, and the administration’s failure to condemn or correct misconduct, signified a breakdown of the university’s symbolic order. Instead of serving as role models, top figures became cautionary tales.

Even teaching materials and curricula were not free from controversy. Faculty quietly noted instances of syllabus plagiarism and intellectual property violations in new programs introduced by the appointed management. In the rush to start newly decreed departments and institutes (such as the new Faculty of Law or the Data Science & AI Institute), there were claims that course descriptions and syllabi were lifted from other universities without attribution – essentially a copy-paste approach to building an academic program, mirroring the copy-paste ethos seen in some administrators’ theses. While such cases were harder to document publicly, they contributed to an atmosphere of distrust. Long-serving Boğaziçi professors lamented that the institution’s emphasis on academic rigor and originality had been replaced by a culture of expediency and image. An essay in Herkese Bilim Teknoloji noted pointedly that “plagiarism is a serious matter, not to be taken lightly” and that Boğaziçi’s saga proved how dangerous it was to ignore ethical standards. The essayist, herself a Boğaziçi faculty member, argued that the very fact the government could appoint someone like Bulu without vetting his academic integrity showed a flawed system – and that the university community’s quick exposure of his plagiarism demonstrated that the community, if empowered, could safeguard academic values better than political appointees.

In sum, a series of scandals – from data leaks and censorship to plagiarism and fake credentials – shredded the bonds of trust within Boğaziçi University. Students lost trust that their personal data or academic records were safe from politicized meddling. Faculty lost trust that appointments were being made on merit or that ethical breaches would be addressed. And the public lost trust in Boğaziçi’s image as a bastion of excellence, seeing it increasingly in the headlines for ignominious reasons. The university, once in the news for its top rankings or research breakthroughs, was now “in the news for its plagiarism and protests”, as one Turkish commentator dryly noted. This collapse of trust is both a cause and a consequence of the symbolization failure: the inability of the institution’s name and rituals to assure meaning or credibility. When Boğaziçi’s own degrees and titles come to be questioned – if a Boğaziçi PhD might be plagiarized, or a Boğaziçi dean might lack integrity – the symbolic capital that the university accrued over decades evaporates.

Closure of Research Centers and Gutting of Academic Governance

One of the most concrete and devastating developments at Boğaziçi post-2021 has been the systematic closure or incapacitation of numerous research centers and governance bodies. These centers – many of them nationally or internationally renowned – were pillars of Boğaziçi’s academic strength, providing space and resources for scientific inquiry, policy research, and cultural studies. Yet under the appointed administration, they were treated as obstacles to be removed, often with startling force and disregard for their value. This amounted to a gutting of academic infrastructure and self-governance, as critical functions were either shut down or brought under tight rectorate control.

In 2022, a wave of evictions targeted many of Boğaziçi’s independent research units. According to records, offices of numerous research centers were cleared out with little or no warning – faculty and staff arrived to find door locks changed and their work materials stuffed into trash bags. The administration provided either perfunctory or no explanation, simply ordering these centers to vacate their premises. For example, the Istanbul Mathematical Sciences Center (IMBM) – the only mathematics research center of its kind in Turkey – was abruptly ordered to be emptied in May 2022. When the center’s academic director resisted on grounds that no alternative space had been allocated (unlike previous relocations where some replacement was given), Rector İnci simply sent personnel to change the locks, effectively sealing the center shut. “We were never told why the center was being closed,” said Dr. Tınaz Ekim of the IMBM Executive Board; “one day they came to inspect the building without informing anyone, weeks later we got a written notice to evacuate”. The IMBM, housed on Boğaziçi’s Kandilli campus, had hosted international workshops and visiting scholars in mathematics for years. Its closure, done by force, sent shockwaves through the academic community – the rector had shuttered a hub of scientific excellence with no stated rationale, even as faculty pleaded for dialogue. The European Mathematical Society and the American Mathematical Society took note, as did Turkish science advocates, underscoring that this action harmed Turkey’s global academic standing. But IMBM was not alone. The Peace Education Application and Research Center, focusing on conflict resolution and peace studies, was similarly evicted. The Social Policy Forum, which conducted research on social issues and had partnerships with international institutions, was removed from its offices.

Another egregious case was the fate of Boğaziçi’s Archive and Documentation Center. Established in 2015, this center had been carefully curating archival collections (including personal archives of notable figures) and was a resource for researchers. In March 2022, the rectorate suddenly decided to close the Archive Center and merge it into the main library, issuing orders overnight. The building housing the Archive on the South Campus was emptied out; reportedly, the decision was driven by a desire to repurpose that prime space for administrative uses (colloquially, speculation was that the rector’s team wanted a new office site). Staff of the Archive Center were dismissed, and the collections were hastily moved under the library’s custody. A Gazete Duvar report from March 9, 2022, titled “Boğaziçi University Archive and Documentation Center emptied,” chronicled how abruptly this occurred. Boğaziçi historians and archivists decried the move, noting that archives are specialized facilities – they feared precious documents could be damaged or access could be lost in this sudden transition. It also symbolized a break with institutional memory: the Archive Center was literally where Boğaziçi’s own history and identity were preserved, and shutting it down hinted that the new administration had little regard for preserving the past. Bianet similarly reported “Naci İnci has closed the Boğaziçi Archive and Documentation Center”, emphasizing the unilateral nature of the decision.

By the end of 2022, the list of academic entities either closed or crippled by these measures was long. In addition to IMBM, the Peace Education Center, Social Policy Forum, and Archive Center, the Byzantine Studies Research Center was targeted – despite it being mid-project on internationally funded research initiatives. The Human Development Research Center was shut down in the middle of organizing an international conference. The Nazım Hikmet Culture and Arts Research Center, dedicated to literature and arts, was also closed. Perhaps most shockingly, Boğaziçi’s Telecommunication and Informatics Technologies Center (TETAM), the largest research unit at the university which housed cutting-edge labs for wireless networks, nanotechnology, and communications, was effectively dismantled in late 2023. Equipment from TETAM’s labs – supporting 5G/6G research, virtualized base stations, and nano-communication devices – was piled into garbage bags and the center’s space reassigned to an administrative unit (reportedly the IT Department). Photos circulated of rooms full of blue trash bags containing lab apparatus and instruments. Academics were horrified: “They put science in trash bags and squeezed it into 45 square meters,” read one headline. Indeed, Gazete Duvar’s report on December 9, 2023 described TETAM’s evacuation in vivid detail: a project that had been funded since 2007 by the state’s development agency, resulting in a state-of-the-art research center by 2013, was now unceremoniously cleared out without even informing its academic supervisors. The director of TETAM learned only afterward that the labs would be given to the computing services department; this move was apparently done to consolidate space for administrative offices, but at the cost of halting important scientific projects. Not only local projects but also international collaborations (including TÜBİTAK and EU-funded research) were disrupted. Here was a clear example of how scientific productivity was sacrificed for bureaucratic expediency – research infrastructure built over years was tossed aside in days.

[*] Boğaziçi academics, in their gowns, holding signs reading “We do not accept, we do not give up” (Kabul Etmiyoruz, Vazgeçmiyoruz) and marking “1000 times we said it” during their ongoing vigil on campus. Despite over 1000 days of protest against the appointed administration, key decisions – like the closure of research centers – were made unilaterally and often without explanation.

The closure of these centers was intertwined with the gutting of academic governance structures. Boğaziçi’s Senate and Executive Board – traditionally forums where faculty could debate and shape academic policy – were rendered impotent. The rectorate either bypassed them completely or reconstituted them with loyalists. For instance, when Melih Bulu first took office, he promptly dismissed all incumbent deans to install either himself or outsiders in those roles. Later, Naci İnci followed suit by not recognizing faculty-elected department chairs and instead appointing interim chairs at will. In one case, the Dean of the Faculty of Arts & Sciences was removed and the rector named himself as acting dean, which is highly unusual (a reference notes that in February 2022, Rector İnci appointed himself as a faculty dean). These moves concentrated academic and administrative power in the hands of a few appointees, eliminating the internal checks that departmental councils or faculty boards might provide. Professors found that critical decisions – such as which courses would be offered and who would teach them – were now being dictated top-down. A poignant example occurred in 2022 when certain arts and elective courses were arbitrarily not approved by the administration, without coherent reasons, effectively censoring some curriculum content. This “veto” on courses was unprecedented at Boğaziçi, where curriculum had always been a faculty prerogative. It signaled an erosion of academic freedom in pedagogy, and often targeted courses or instructors viewed as critical of the administration (or aligned with liberal arts values the regime disfavored).

Collectively, these closures and governance usurpations contributed heavily to the “symbolization failure” at Boğaziçi. Research centers are symbolic heartlands of a university’s intellectual life – shutting them down and packing science into trash bags was a stark visual of knowledge being discarded. It told the community that the production of knowledge was less important than the display of authority. Each center closed was a blow to a constituency: mathematicians, historians, policy analysts, engineers – all saw their institutional homes attacked. The message to students and young researchers was discouraging: fields that had flourished at Boğaziçi were now effectively marked as unwanted. The disbanding of governance bodies likewise broke the symbolic contract that had existed at Boğaziçi: the idea that the university was self-governing, rational, and inclusive of its scholars in decision-making. Instead, Boğaziçi was ruled by decree, with no symbolic differentiation from any bureaucratic state office. This hollowing-out of academic governance meant that the content of decisions often appeared irrational or counterproductive (why sabotage your own research centers?), furthering a sense that the administration was guided by political symbolism rather than academic sense. For example, some observers speculated that closing institutes like the Peace Education Center or Social Policy Forum was motivated by an ideological aversion to the liberal or critical perspectives those centers represented – in other words, a symbolic purge of intellectual paradigms not aligned with the ruling ideology. Similarly, the Law and Communications faculties that Erdogan decreed in 2021 (widely seen as an attempt to inject loyal faculty and conservative curricula) were perhaps meant to be symbols of a “new Boğaziçi”, but when their establishment was challenged in court, even the judiciary’s own prosecutor opined that creating such faculties by presidential fiat violated the constitution’s guarantee of university autonomy. (Indeed, in October 2022, the Council of State’s prosecutor found the setup of new faculties and an institute at Boğaziçi unconstitutional, a view later echoed by the court’s annulment of those actions.)

In essence, the physical and administrative landscape of Boğaziçi University was radically altered: spaces and institutions that embodied the university’s scholarly mission were eliminated or repurposed, and the collegial, consensus-based culture of governance was supplanted by a rigid hierarchy loyal to external authority. This created physical and symbolic voids. Physically, the labs went dark, the archive fell silent, and some academic programs (especially in the social sciences and humanities) were left adrift without support. Symbolically, the idea of Boğaziçi as a universitas – a community of scholars – suffered an almost irreparable rupture. The consequences include lost research output, flight of talent (some prominent researchers left for other institutions or abroad when their centers closed), and a breakdown of the social contract that kept faculty and administration working in trust. What remained was an image of Boğaziçi projected by the administration that emphasized form over substance: they touted new initiatives (like flashy new institutes described in the next section) even as the real engines of knowledge were being dismantled.

Parachute Appointments, Nepotism, and Intellectual Property Concerns

The disruption of Boğaziçi’s academic core was exacerbated by a spree of parachute appointments and perceived nepotism. With elected chairs and deans removed, the rectorate filled the vacuum with individuals often seen as politically aligned or personally connected, rather than academically distinguished or chosen by meritocratic search. Turkish media and the Boğaziçi community coined the term “paraşüt akademisyen” (parachute academic) to describe the influx of faculty hired or promoted under the new regime without following standard competitive processes. By early 2024, as noted, over 70 such parachute appointments had been identified. These included not only new junior faculty but also external faculty brought in to lead departments or newly created programs. The concern among the established faculty was twofold: qualifications and transparency. In several cases, appointees had thin academic resumes or came from lower-ranked institutions, raising questions about whether Boğaziçi’s long-held standards were being eroded to accommodate loyalists. Meanwhile, the hiring processes were opaque – job postings, if they existed at all, were perfunctory, and departmental opinions were neither sought nor heeded. For example, posts on Boğaziçi’s website for faculty openings were sometimes listed with extremely short application windows, or tailored requirements that matched a pre-selected candidate’s profile, fueling speculation of biased recruitment. A telling anecdote involved a new instructor in a technical field whose entire course syllabus was discovered to be copied from an online source – when confronted, the response was defensive rather than apologetic, reinforcing the sense that intellectual property and teaching quality were secondary concerns under this administration.

Furthermore, nepotism alarms were raised when relatives and associates of the appointed officials surfaced in university roles. Turkish press reported on allegations that some hires had personal ties to members of the Council of Higher Education or the ruling party’s educational networks, though concrete evidence was scarce due to lack of transparency. What could be tracked were patterns of patronage: for instance, the new Communication Faculty (established by presidential order) was staffed largely by people from pro-government media circles rather than by experienced academics in communication studies. Similarly, key administrative posts (e.g., vice-rectors, general secretary, advisors) were filled with figures whose main qualification seemed to be loyalty. This contributed to a sense that Boğaziçi was being colonized by external networks – its prestigious platform handed over to those who hadn’t earned it through the traditional academic ladder.

One high-profile example was the appointment of Prof. Selami Kuran as the founding dean of the new Law Faculty in 2021. Kuran, an academic from outside Boğaziçi, was installed as dean but ended up resigning within months amid reports that he was uncomfortable with the situation and perhaps with Bulu’s leadership. After his resignation, rather than consult the faculty (which in fact had almost no other law professors at that time, given the faculty was brand new), Rector Bulu simply appointed himself as acting dean of the Law Faculty – a move that underscored how far the “one-man” approach could go. This was reported by media (e.g., Sözcü) as “Boğaziçi Law dean resigned, the rector appointed himself in his place”, highlighting the administrative absurdity.

In the academic realm, the large number of new faculty hired in a short span also led to concerns about plagiarism and academic ethics at the individual level. As noted, beyond Bulu and Önder, accusations emerged against others – including an attempt to discredit one of the prominent protester professors, Prof. Tuna Tuğcu, by scrutinizing his PhD thesis. In mid-2024, a pro-government outlet ran a piece claiming “Tuna Tuğcu’s doctoral thesis is plagiarized”, alleging he had copied sections from a 1978 paper. The article (in Yeni Şafak) implied that the Boğaziçi resistance leaders were hypocrites on the issue of plagiarism. Tuğcu denied wrongdoing, and many saw this as a smear campaign timed to tarnish one of the movement’s figureheads. It’s worth noting that the symbolization of individuals became a battleground: the government’s allies tried to symbolically invert the narrative by painting resistance leaders with the same brush of plagiarism that had stained the appointees. However, the independence and rigor of such accusations were questionable, and they did not seem to undergo the impartial investigations that Bulu’s or Önder’s cases did. In any event, these episodes further muddied the waters, making it hard for outsiders to discern the truth and adding to the general sense that Boğaziçi’s academic credibility was at risk.

Another subtle but significant domain was intellectual property violations in course content and program design. Faculty privately pointed out that some of the newly introduced courses – especially in hot fields like data science, management, or media – had syllabi that were nearly identical to those found in MIT’s OpenCourseWare or other university websites. While drawing inspiration from established courses is common, outright copying of descriptions and reading lists without attribution crosses ethical lines. When Boğaziçi’s long-serving faculty senate was functional, it used to review new course proposals for content and originality, but with the senate sidelined, such quality control lapsed. This raised an uncomfortable prospect: students might be paying for courses that are essentially plagiarized content, delivered by parachuted instructors of uncertain expertise. It undermines the value proposition of a Boğaziçi education and certainly the intellectual property rights of the original course designers elsewhere. These issues seldom made headlines, as they were often caught informally and resolved quietly (e.g., a department might hastily revise a plagiarized syllabus once pointed out), but the very occurrence was symptomatic of the new low standards.

All these factors – parachute hiring, nepotistic placements, plagiarism controversies – fed into a climate where academic morale plummeted. For the existing Boğaziçi faculty who had built their careers on merit, seeing unqualified or unethical individuals elevated was demoralizing. Many senior professors took early retirement or left for positions abroad, citing an inability to work under the new regime. For students, too, confidence was shaken: they could no longer be sure if the lecturer in front of them was appointed for their scholarship or for their political connections. A sense of “dual reality” emerged on campus: the official reality projected by the rectorate (of new programs, new faces, and “modernization”), and the lived reality felt by many students and staff (of declining quality, confusion, and disillusionment). This duality itself is a form of symbolization failure – the university’s image splits, unable to unify into one coherent identity.

The bureaucratic opacity around all these appointments also meant it was difficult to challenge them formally. When some faculty and alumni tried to use legal means – for instance, suing against the irregular faculty hires or the institute creations – they met with mixed results. Courts often moved slowly, and even when they found in favor of plaintiffs (as Danıştay did regarding new faculties), the administration found workarounds or simply ignored the spirit of rulings while awaiting appeals. This left internal whistleblowers or dissidents with little recourse but public protest, which, as we have seen, was met with retaliation.

In summary, the integrity of Boğaziçi’s human capital was compromised by a series of questionable appointments and ethical lapses. The traditional symbols of academic legitimacy – fair hiring, scholarly accomplishment, intellectual property – were eroded. When a university can no longer assure that its faculty are the best of the best chosen by due process, or that its courses are original and rigorous, it loses its symbolic power as a beacon of knowledge. Boğaziçi’s collapse on this front shows how quickly decades of reputation can be undermined. It’s a stark demonstration that universities run on trust as much as on truth: trust that the system producing knowledge is itself sound. At Boğaziçi, that trust was systematically broken, contributing significantly to the overall collapse after 2021.

Irrational Decision-Making and Disdain for Representation

A puzzling feature of Boğaziçi University’s post-2021 collapse is the seemingly irrational nature of many rectorate decisions – actions that often lacked logical academic justification and even appeared self-sabotaging for the university’s interests. These decisions can only be understood as political or symbolic gestures, rather than reasoned choices for institutional betterment. Moreover, they reveal a consistent disdain for representative input from the university community, reinforcing the top-down “we know best” approach of the appointed administration.

We have already discussed several such decisions: dumping manure on the protest lawn, changing the email domain, evicting research centers, etc. Each of these had a flavor of spite or image-driven irrationality. For instance, what does Boğaziçi or its students gain from switching “boun.edu.tr” to “bogazici.edu.tr”? Objectively, it created confusion and technical hassle, with no academic benefit – but subjectively, perhaps it gave the administrators a sense of stamping a new identity (or erasing a former one). Prof. Cem Say’s bewilderment – “how does this contribute anything?” – encapsulated how detached the move was from rational planning. Similarly, the closing of TETAM – halting ongoing high-tech research – was rationally indefensible from a scientific standpoint, given Turkey’s ambitions in technology. But in the calculus of the rectorate, maybe it made sense to break up networks of faculty who were not subservient (TETAM’s academics had been among the vocal critics). In other words, a political rationality replaced academic rationality. The cost to the university’s scholarly mission was accepted as collateral damage if the decision shored up the administration’s control or sent a message to detractors.

Another example: In early 2025, Boğaziçi University was quietly withdrawn from the European University Association (EUA) by Rector Naci İnci. The EUA is a coalition of hundreds of universities committed to common standards and collaboration in higher education. Boğaziçi had been a member, which allowed it external evaluation and partnership opportunities. The decision to pull out was made unilaterally and only confirmed after the fact in March 2025, prompting criticism that Boğaziçi was isolating itself to avoid international scrutiny. It seemed to reflect Inci’s disdain for any external accountability – by leaving EUA, he dodged comparative benchmarking of Boğaziçi’s governance and quality (since EUA conducts institutional evaluations and issues statements on university autonomy). However, leaving a reputable network harms the university’s international standing and its students’ opportunities. The irony is that Boğaziçi long prided itself on being globally connected, yet the appointed administration deliberately turned inward, valuing absolute control over global reputation.

The pattern of opacity and unilateralism extended to everyday governance. Departmental elections for chairpersons were simply ignored; in one striking case, the entire Psychology Department’s chair and vice chairs were removed without stated reason, and new ones imposed. When asked for justification, the rectorate provided none, effectively saying it was within their rights. This again suggests that representation – even the representation of departments by their chosen colleagues – meant nothing to the new rulers. The symbolic import is huge: it told academics that their voice was irrelevant. Rational administration would dictate consulting those who know their fields best (e.g., letting a department choose its chair ensures the person is respected and can manage the team). But that rationality was discarded in favor of demonstrating that “appointments come from above, not below.”

Likewise, student representation vanished from decision-making bodies. Boğaziçi traditionally had student council input in some committees and at least an ear to student petitions. Post-2021, student council elections were disrupted and the legitimacy of student voices was denied. When students organized town halls or wrote open letters, they were met with silence or punishment. For example, students who protested on campus in 2021 and 2022 faced not just police action but also disciplinary probes that led to suspensions or expulsions from the university. Dozens of students were suspended for weeks or a semester for participating in peaceful actions – an irrational stance if one values a healthy campus climate, but rational if the goal is to intimidate and silence a portion of the student body.

One symbolic incident stands out: in 2022, Boğaziçi University’s General Secretary (the top administrative officer under the rector), Hasan Fehmi Topal, was alleged to have acted as an informant against his own colleagues. A Gazete Duvar article from November 2022 carried the headline, “Boğaziçi University General Secretary Hasan Fehmi Topal accused of being an informant”, suggesting he may have reported faculty activities or speech to outside authorities. Whether or not this was substantiated, the mere report indicates the level of mistrust and the collapse of normal internal solidarity. If true, it exemplifies how Boğaziçi’s new management viewed the academic community with such suspicion that they would plant or encourage informers rather than engage openly with dissent. Needless to say, such behavior is toxic to any institution – it is antithetical to the collegial, open exchange that universities thrive on.

From a broader perspective, the irrationality of the rectorate’s decisions can be interpreted through the lens of symbolic politics. In a regime of “symbolization failure,” as at Boğaziçi, decisions are made not to solve real problems, but to project power or enact an ideology. The actual outcomes often worsen real problems (academic quality drops, morale sinks, etc.), but that is secondary. The primary aim might be to show “who is in charge” or to impress a political patron or base with a show of toughness against an “elitist” institution. Indeed, pro-government media often framed Boğaziçi as a nest of elitism or liberalism that needed “cleansing” or firm control. Thus, from that viewpoint, irrational acts like locking out esteemed professors or scattering a math institute could be sold as “bringing Boğaziçi to heel”. It is a kind of symbolic violence where the act’s significance matters more than its practical effect. Dumping manure isn’t a policy to improve campus horticulture; it’s a statement: “Your protest is trash to us.” Changing the email domain isn’t to streamline communication; it’s saying: “We wipe away the past.” These are acts of communicative irrationality – they communicate a message of dominance and break from tradition, even as they flout reason.

The disdain for academic representation is also evidenced by how the administration interacted (or refused to interact) with the protesting faculty. For over 1000 days, as faculty gathered in their gowns each workday at 12:15 PM, not once did Rector İnci or his team engage in dialogue with them. Instead, they were treated as a nuisance to be outwaited or outmaneuvered. This non-engagement is irrational from a conflict-resolution perspective – one might at least attempt negotiation to restore normalcy – but rational if the goal is to avoid granting them any recognition. In some autocratic logic, speaking to the protesters would legitimize them, so better to pretend they don’t exist (while quietly undermining them via measures like fences and manure). The outcome, of course, was a perpetual stalemate on campus: a surreal daily scene of silent professors turning their backs while administrators carried on inside the Rectorate as if nothing was happening. Over time, this became a theater of the absurd, an embodiment of unintelligibility: the two sides communicated in symbolic acts (backs turned, or manure dumped) rather than speech.

One more example of questionable decision-making was Boğaziçi’s handling of its Computer Engineering department versus a new Institute of Data Science and Artificial Intelligence – which we’ll explore in more detail in the next section. But briefly, the establishment of a Data Science & AI Institute by presidential decree (without consultation of the existing Computer Engineering and related departments) led to overlapping turf and conflict. The rational approach would have been to build on Boğaziçi’s existing strengths in computer science by expanding programs collaboratively. Instead, the institute was formed externally and then had to be integrated, causing friction and duplication. Even the Council of State’s prosecutor saw it as legally dubious. This indicates again that decisions were made for show (“We opened an AI institute!” – a politically trendy move) rather than for substance (making sure it fits into the academic structure logically).

In conclusion, the Boğaziçi rectorate’s pattern of decision-making post-2021 can be characterized as autocratic, performative, and dismissive of rational input. The irrationality is not random, however – it consistently serves to amplify the administration’s control or to signal a break from the past. Unfortunately, this came at the expense of the university’s functionality and coherence. By disregarding the voices of those who best understood the institution (its faculty, students, alumni) and by acting in ways that often contradicted educational logic, the administration deepened the crisis. The symbolic message emanating from these actions was clear: academic values and community representation do not matter here. And when such values are negated, the very meaning of a university is put in question. This is a core element of “symbolization failure” – the point at which the actions of leadership no longer align with the symbols and purposes a university is meant to uphold, leaving observers confounded and the community fractured.

Visibility over Productivity: Image, Optics and the Politicization of Knowledge

One of the themes emerging from the Boğaziçi saga is that visibility and optics began to replace genuine academic productivity and quality in the priorities of the university’s new management. In the wake of the institutional takeover, Boğaziçi’s appointed administrators often emphasized showcase projects, media presence, and superficial indicators of activity, while sidelining or even undermining the actual engines of scholarly output. This shift can be seen as part of a broader politicization of knowledge – where what matters is not the creation of knowledge per se, but the appearance of a modern, loyal, government-aligned academic enterprise.

A salient example is the creation of new institutes and programs with grand titles. The Institute of Data Science and Artificial Intelligence (Veri Bilimi ve Yapay Zekâ Enstitüsü) was founded at Boğaziçi in 2021 by a top-down decree. On paper, this sounds like a progressive move – AI and data science are cutting-edge fields. The university’s social media and press releases touted this institute as a bold step to solve “world problems” with AI, accompanied by glossy promotional materials. However, behind the scenes, the Boğaziçi Computer Engineering Department (CmpE) – which houses the university’s expertise in AI and data – was largely bypassed in the institute’s creation. There were concerns that the institute was being staffed and led by figures chosen for their political reliability rather than top research credentials. Indeed, while Boğaziçi’s established faculty in computer science (including internationally recognized experts in machine learning) were protesting and being marginalized, the institute seemed to function as a parallel structure, possibly to attract funding and attention under direct rectorate control. This led to a schism: the competence and substance remained in the traditional department, while the image and funding flowed to the new institute.

The tension here reflects a microcosm of how competence was often substituted with image. Prof. Dr. Cem Say, a prominent AI scholar at Boğaziçi (and also a public intellectual), was one of those who questioned how the institute was being run. He could not comprehend why one would not simply strengthen the existing department and interdepartmental programs, unless the motive was to create a separate enclave shielded from the influence of long-time faculty. The politicization of knowledge in this context meant that research directions and academic appointments in fields like AI could be influenced by political agendas – for example, prioritizing projects that align with government narratives (like security or surveillance technologies) over fundamental research, or hiring researchers whose profile fit the desired optics (e.g., having international degrees but maybe lacking in actual publications, which can nonetheless be showcased as “from abroad”).

Similarly, the new Faculty of Communication (briefly named after a pro-government media mogul, Aydın Doğan, until it was quickly dissolved due to legal issues) was launched with fanfare – again projecting that Boğaziçi was expanding into trendy fields like media and communication. Yet, that faculty’s opening bypassed the input of Boğaziçi’s existing social science and humanities scholars. It appeared more as a political plant – possibly to provide sinecures for ideologues or to shape media education in a direction favorable to the regime. Indeed, in late 2021, President Erdoğan had issued a decree establishing new law and communication faculties at Boğaziçi (widely criticized as an attempt to insert loyal faculty). Those faculties largely remained shells – a dean here, a few hired instructors there – and in 2022 the Council of State found the creation of these faculties by executive order to be unlawful. Eventually, Erdoğan rescinded the Communication Faculty in 2023 (hence the note about it being closed and replaced by another structure). Throughout, however, Boğaziçi’s administration acted as if these were triumphs: they counted the existence of these entities in their “achievements”, even though academically they produced little of note and were embroiled in litigation and controversy.

This focus on optics extended to internal communications as well. Boğaziçi University’s official website and social media under the rectorate showcased images of new labs being opened, memoranda of understanding with industry, and even photo-ops of the rector with government officials. All the while, actual academic output (research publications, conference hosting, etc.) saw a decline – anecdotally, faculty report that Boğaziçi’s publication count and sponsored research projects decreased after 2021, as many productive scholars left or lost support. But such metrics were not highlighted by the admin; instead, the appearance of being busy and progressive was curated. For instance, a minor renovation of a classroom might be trumpeted as “modernization of facilities”, or a series of talks by pro-government figures on campus could be labeled a “major academic event series”, even if unrelated to the curriculum. This created a propaganda-like veneer, where state-friendly media would echo that “Boğaziçi is flourishing under the new management, opening X and Y” while ignoring the exodus of talent and drop in global rankings (Boğaziçi, unsurprisingly, fell in international university rankings due to the turmoil, though the admin dismissed such rankings).

The substitution of competence with image was perhaps most tragically illustrated by the fate of Boğaziçi’s institutional knowledge and reputation. A university’s reputation is a hard-earned symbol, built on the real accomplishments of its members. Post-2021, Boğaziçi’s reputation became something the new leadership attempted to reforge artificially: by aligning with government narratives and staking claim to prestige through association rather than through continuing its legacy of academic freedom. For example, Boğaziçi started participating very visibly in state-sponsored events like TEKNOFEST (Turkey’s big technofestival backed by the government), showcasing student projects there and garnering pro-government media praise for “patriotic” innovation. There is nothing wrong with students joining such events, of course, but the emphasis was telling – while before Boğaziçi might highlight, say, a student winning an international math competition or a faculty’s research in Nature, now the emphasis was on being seen at events championed by officials, almost to curry favor.

Another dimension of politicization was content-based. Certain research topics were subtly or overtly discouraged, while others were encouraged. It was reported that work touching on sensitive social issues (like LGBTQ+ rights – remember that Boğaziçi protests initially had a strong showing of LGBT solidarity, which the government fiercely criticized) was under scrutiny. Meanwhile, projects in defense or nationalist history might find more open doors. Boğaziçi’s LGBTQ+ student club had been shut down by Melih Bulu in early 2021 amid the protests, on the pretext of a controversy over an artwork, and it was never reinstated. This showed that some forms of knowledge or inquiry (gender studies, for example) were not just devalued but actively repressed, while others aligned with state ideologies were promoted, regardless of their intrinsic academic merit.

The culmination of these trends is that Boğaziçi started to feel less like a university and more like a stage. Visibility replaced productivity – what mattered was that the administration could point to something visible (even if hollow) to justify itself. The real production of knowledge – which is often a slow, conflict-ridden, bottoms-up process – was too messy and uncontrollable for an admin that prized obedience and smooth narratives. So it was sidelined. Faculty who were research-active but critical found themselves with reduced resources or pushed out, while those willing to play ball (perhaps with less stellar records) got positions and grants. Over time, this could lead to a brain drain and a culture of mediocrity. As one Boğaziçi professor lamented anonymously in an interview: “We used to be known for our output. Now it feels like we’re known for our outbursts – and not even ours, but the administration’s.” This bitter quip underscores that rather than scholarly achievements, it was the bizarre actions of the administration making headlines.

Finally, it’s important to note that these phenomena at Boğaziçi are not isolated. They reflect a wider question: what becomes of the university as an institution in a society where image often trumps reality and where AI and mass information tools can manufacture appearances? In Turkey and elsewhere, authoritarian or populist regimes have sought to control universities not necessarily to destroy them outright, but to use them as tools for legitimacy – a concept sometimes called “authoritarian academic capture.” In Boğaziçi’s case, the attempt to capture it involved creating a simulacrum of a thriving university: lots of social media posts, new buildings, new programs, but internally a decay of the rigorous academic culture. The broader worry is that such captured institutions produce graduates who might have the paper credentials (since the degree carries the name) but not the same quality of education or critical thinking that name once guaranteed. This aspect will be explored further in the concluding sections about the validity of degrees in the AI age. But already within Boğaziçi, students were aware of the discrepancy: they saw which professors were leaving or sidelined, they felt which classes were watered down or which research opportunities vanished. So the symbolic capital of a Boğaziçi diploma started to wobble.

In summary, the triumph of visibility over productivity at Boğaziçi manifests as a cautionary tale: a university can be performatively busy and ostensibly “modern”, yet simultaneously be hollowing out its true academic core. When knowledge becomes politicized and competence gives way to image, the institution’s essence is at stake. The case of Boğaziçi shows how an environment of repression and propaganda erodes the genuine pursuit of knowledge – a loss not only to one university, but to the broader scholarly and civic community.

Failed Symbols: Why Tuna Tuğcu, Cem Say and Others Could Not Forge a Collective Subject

Throughout the Boğaziçi crisis, certain individuals emerged as symbolic figureheads of the resistance. Professors like Tuna Tuğcu (of Computer Engineering) and Cem Say (of Computer Engineering, and a prominent public science communicator) became well-known voices defending the university’s autonomy and values. Students and alumni also looked up to figures like Dr. Can Candan (a documentary filmmaker and lecturer who was very active in protests) and others. These individuals often spoke to the media, rallied colleagues, and, in a sense, personalized the struggle. One might expect that such respected figures could consolidate the Boğaziçi community into a “collective subject” with a clear identity and direction. However, in the end, their representation – while notable – failed to unify the community to the point of achieving structural change. This invites analysis of what went wrong in the symbolic framing of the resistance leadership.

Firstly, it must be noted that the opposition at Boğaziçi was decentralized and prided itself on being leaderless in formal terms. The academics turned their backs as a group, always emphasizing that it was a collective act of all who participated. The moment one person is singled out as a “leader”, it can both empower and endanger them. The government certainly tried to single out leaders to attack. We saw how Prof. Tuğcu was targeted with suspensions and even a character assassination attempt via plagiarism allegations. Similarly, Prof. Cem Say, being very outspoken on Twitter (often with acerbic wit about the situation), became a bugbear for pro-government commentators who painted him as a troublemaker. Both Tuğcu and Say were depicted by adversaries not as representatives of a legitimate faculty grievance, but as “political” actors or even as part of an elitist cabal unwilling to accept government authority. In essence, the state’s narrative machinery attempted to demonize or belittle these symbols, which likely limited their ability to rally broader public support. For example, when Cem Say spoke out about the domain name change – pointing out its absurdity – supporters of the rector accused him of exaggerating and being resistant to any change for the sake of it. The symbolic potency of his critique (coming from a department chair) was thus diffused by partisan framing that he was just a disgruntled secular professor at odds with the government’s vision.

Prof. Tuna Tuğcu, by virtue of being at the heart of multiple sagas (the data leak expose, the manure incident blowback, etc.), certainly became a symbol for many within Boğaziçi of principled stand. Yet, that very fact made him a single point of failure in some respects. When he was suspended or at risk of being fired, the focus of the movement often shifted to defending Tuğcu himself (e.g., campaigns to reinstate him) rather than the larger issues. This is not to say those campaigns were wrong – protecting individuals from authoritarian retaliation is crucial. But it shows how the resistance’s energy could be consumed in reactive battles (save Prof. X from injustice Y) rather than proactive institutional demands.

There’s also an aspect of the burden of representation. Tuğcu and Say, though beloved by many students and alumni, are both computer scientists – not exactly the typical political activists. They stepped up out of necessity. But because they are from STEM fields, some in the humanities or social sciences at Boğaziçi maybe didn’t immediately identify with them as leaders. Conversely, other potential figureheads from those other domains (for instance, a prominent sociology or political science professor) might have had less visibility. The result was a somewhat fragmented symbolic leadership, where different groups rallied around different people (e.g., some students related more to Can Candan, an LGBTQ+-friendly figure who was dismissed from teaching; international supporters might cite Esra Mungan, a psychologist who earlier had opposed government actions, etc.). The lack of a singular unifying leader could be seen as a strength (prevents easy decapitation of the movement) but also a weakness (harder to formulate a unified strategy or narrative that the broader public can latch onto).

It’s also crucial to consider that the Boğaziçi resistance was highly intellectual and internal in its discourse. Hashtags like #KabulEtmiyoruzVazgeçmiyoruz and #DirenBoğaziçi were powerful within certain circles, but to the average citizen or even many Boğaziçi alumni, the struggle may have seemed abstract. The appointed administration, meanwhile, used blunt symbolic acts (like calling protesters terrorists, or the manure stunt) that, however crude, conveyed a simple message. The professors’ symbolic acts were more refined (turning backs, holding signs referencing academic freedom). Over time, these might have lost their resonance beyond campus. Symbolization failure in this context means the symbols of the resistance didn’t translate into a broader collective identity that could challenge the regime’s narrative. The regime successfully labeled the protestors as simply anti-government elitists in the eyes of some segments of society, blunting potential wider solidarity. The inability to overcome that framing is part of why the protest movement, despite enormous courage, did not force a course reversal.

The student movement too, while vibrant, did not coalesce into a lasting organization beyond the hashtag activism and on-campus demos. After the initial 2021 protests, many student leaders were arrested or intimidated, and by 2022 the student body entered a phase of quieter dissent (some focusing on completing studies in a tough environment, others graduating and leaving). Thus, the professors carried the torch longer – but professors alone, especially when constantly under threat, could not broaden the struggle. In classic social movement theory, for a protest to yield transformation, it often needs to build a coalition beyond its immediate actors. Boğaziçi’s cause of university autonomy did get support from other universities for a while (e.g., faculty from elsewhere held sympathy protests), and there was public sympathy among urban middle classes. Yet, as time wore on, the lack of concrete wins and the protraction of the standoff perhaps led to fatigue and a kind of narrative staleness. The public moved on to other issues (Turkey had many, including economic troubles, elections etc. in 2023). Without a charismatic leader constantly re-invigorating the narrative, the Boğaziçi story slipped from headline prominence.

It’s worth noting, too, that Boğaziçi’s resistance aesthetics – educated, cosmopolitan, sometimes sarcastic – may not have resonated in all parts of Turkey. While that very aesthetic (rainbow flags, English slogans at times, music, art) endeared it to global audiences and liberal Turks, it might have alienated more conservative or apolitical folks who didn’t immediately grasp what was at stake. The government exploited this by injecting culture-war elements (accusing Boğaziçi protesters of blasphemy in the case of an artwork involving a religious image, or highlighting the LGBTQ+ presence to sway conservative opinion). Thus, the symbols that the Boğaziçi movement chose or became associated with were turned against it in the wider symbolic battlefield. This again reflects a failure to consolidate a singular positive collective subject that a broad public would champion. Instead, different audiences saw different subjects: to supporters, the Boğaziçi protestors were brave academics and students; to detractors, they were unruly leftists or culturally alien elements; to the indifferent, it was an ongoing saga they tuned out.

Finally, consider that even within the Boğaziçi community, not everyone actively supported the protests. A minority of faculty and a number of administrative staff and students kept their heads down or even sided with the new administration (some out of genuine belief, others out of fear or careerism). This meant the resistance symbols didn’t even represent absolutely everyone on campus. The appointed administration did manage to co-opt or at least silence segments of the university. For example, when new hires came in, those individuals had no connection to the old Boğaziçi ethos and thus no reason to join protests; their presence diluted the proportion of dissenters over time (if 100 new faculty are hired and are loyal or neutral, that’s a significant addition to a total faculty of a few hundred, thereby affecting the internal balance of sentiments). The net effect is that the notion of a single “Boğaziçi community” against the administration became complicated. The administration tried to cultivate an image of “the silent majority of Boğaziçi just wanting to do their work” vs. “a noisy minority always protesting”. That narrative wasn’t entirely true, but it had enough elements (e.g., not all classes stopped, research continued in parts, some faculty never turned their backs) to create ambiguity. Hence, the collective subject “Boğaziçi” fractured into multiple representations, another facet of symbolization failure.

In summary, figures like Tuna Tuğcu and Cem Say played heroic roles and are widely respected in hindsight, but the structural conditions and powerful counter-symbols deployed by the regime prevented them from uniting all stakeholders into a force capable of reversing the takeover. Theirs was a moral and intellectual leadership, but facing a brute force state apparatus and a pro-government media machine, moral voices often don’t suffice. The Boğaziçi experience thus illustrates how personalities can galvanize resistance but are not enough to overcome a crisis of institutionality. The individuals became symbols, but those symbols could not carry the day when the institutional channels (elections, negotiations, independent courts) were blocked. The movement’s strength – being collective and values-driven – ironically made it hard to reduce into one symbol or spokesperson that could amplify the cause. And when parts of the movement’s symbolism were co-opted or attacked (like the plagiarism smear on Tuğcu, or the constant vilification of protestor academics), it further hindered consolidation of a singular, victorious collective identity.

The Aestheticization of Protest: #DirenBoğaziçi, Empathy Performance, and Limits of Resistance

At the onset, the Boğaziçi protests of 2021 were often compared to the Gezi Park protests of 2013 in Turkey in terms of creativity and spirit. The term “#DirenBoğaziçi” (Resist Boğaziçi) evoked “Diren Gezi” and symbolized a youthful, pluralistic, and artful form of dissent. The aesthetics of the Boğaziçi movement were indeed striking: students hanging improvised art on campus gates, faculty wearing their academic gowns as silent rebuke, protesters holding up inclusive flags and witty placards, and performances (dances, music sessions) turning rallies into quasi-cultural events. This aestheticization of protest had a double-edged effect. On one hand, it drew significant empathy and media attention, especially internationally and among Turkey’s liberal circles. Social media was flooded with images of Boğaziçi students releasing balloons, painting murals, or singing together – scenes that humanized them and contrasted with the drab authoritarianism of the appointed rector. The protest became a sort of cause célèbre, and terms like “Boğaziçi Solidarity” were trending. On the other hand, as months turned into years, this focus on aesthetics and empathy started to highlight the movement’s inability to achieve concrete changes, leading to a drift towards what might be called “empathy performance.”

By “empathy performance,” we refer to actions that aim to move hearts and create symbolic pressure, but which can risk becoming performative routines absent a strategic trajectory. The ongoing faculty vigil is a prime example: it was profoundly moving, a daily moral statement. But after 1000 days, with no sign of recognition from those in power, it almost turned into a ritual for its own sake. Outsiders looking in might sympathize (“How dedicated these teachers are, standing every day!”), yet also feel a sense of futility (“They’ve done this for three years and nothing’s changed?”). Thus the protest, while morally admirable, became less intelligible as a means to an end. It started to seem like a sad tableau – performing resistance to keep the idea alive, rather than a resistance that was building to a resolution. This is a harsh assessment, but it’s one some protest participants themselves began to voice internally: Are we just doing this to not feel defeated, rather than because it’s bringing victory closer? When protest becomes routinized, its aesthetic can overshadow its strategic message. Indeed, media coverage on the 1000th day of protest (January 2025) often focused on the fact of the longevity – “1000 days of academics standing in the cold” – which evokes admiration and pity, rather than galvanizing action. The vigil had in a sense become unintelligible to the outside: it was no longer clear what the path to success was, aside from just continuing to exist in defiance.

Student protests followed a similar trajectory. In early 2021, they were large and confrontational – breaking through barricades, facing arrests. After police crackdowns and pandemic-era restrictions, they morphed into smaller gatherings with more symbolic flair – like open-air classes, “graduation ceremonies” in absentia of an official one, costume days, etc. These were photogenic and kept the issue alive on social networks, but they did not pressure the power structure the way, say, a student strike or occupation might have. In fact, attempts at more structural protest – such as an idea some floated to establish an autonomous “Boğaziçi commune” on campus – did not materialize in a sustained way. For a brief period in 2021, students occupied the campus late into nights, almost living there, and there were collaborative efforts (like a free kitchen, teach-ins, etc.) reminiscent of a commune or occupy movement. However, these fizzled out due to multiple factors: “patience fatigue”, as many students had to juggle academics or feared protracting the semester; “inability to face difference”, meaning divisions emerged between more radical left groups, Kemalist secular students, LGBTI+ activists, etc., causing unity to strain; and the “dominance of digital subjectivity”, where activism happened more on Twitter and Instagram than in building real organizational structures on the ground.

The social media activism (#DirenBoğaziçi and related campaigns) was superb at attracting attention quickly. But like many digital movements, it sometimes gave a false sense of accomplishment – viral posts and trending hashtags can create “clicktivism” where many express support online but that doesn’t necessarily translate into tangible pressure offline. The government, after some initial image damage globally, simply weathered the social media storm. The aesthetic of Boğaziçi protest – colorful, meme-able, hashtag-ready – may have ironically been consumed as content by sympathizers rather than sparking deeper intervention. One could scroll, like, share – and feel morally aligned – yet that did not alter the power imbalance on campus. The aesthetic element also allowed the government to trivialize the protests as mere youthful theatrics in their narrative.

Over time, the visibility of the protest might have even helped the regime adapt its strategy – it knew exactly what the protesters were doing and that, as long as it didn’t over-react with an incident that could create a martyr or global scandal, it could simply grind them down. The protesters, to their credit, kept things peaceful and artful, thus depriving the regime of any excuse for a harsher crackdown. But the regime’s patience (bolstered by its control of resources and media) outlasted the protesters’ ability to escalate. By late 2022 and 2023, Turkey was facing bigger news (elections, economic woes), and Boğaziçi’s plight was old news. Some in the opposition political sphere incorporated Boğaziçi into their talking points (e.g., opposition leaders mentioned it as an example of Erdogan’s overreach), but it did not become a decisive election issue. After the elections, with Erdogan still in power, the prospect of relief via political change dimmed.

We should also consider how empathy from outside turned to a kind of resigned empathy. At first, many in Turkey were outraged on Boğaziçi’s behalf: petitions with thousands of signatures, alumni mobilizing, international academic solidarity letters. But as the situation dragged on with no clear victory, people began to normalize it. Boğaziçi’s vigil became a sad but stable feature: “the academics are still protesting” became akin to background knowledge rather than a call to arms. Empathy remained – few agreed with what the government did – but it wasn’t fresh enough to spur new action. Instead, the protests were sometimes aestheticized in media and arts: for instance, photographers and documentary-makers recorded the poignant images of robed professors in the rain, etc. Those images won sympathy and perhaps even awards, but again, they documented rather than changed the reality.

This phenomenon can be likened to what happened with some other long-running protests globally: the longer a resistance goes without change, the more its aesthetic of persistence is praised, but also the more it risks being seen as futile – a sort of tragic beauty. The phrase “empathy performance” is not to diminish the sincerity of protesters, but to highlight how the framing and repetition can turn genuine acts into a kind of performance that audiences consume emotionally rather than act upon.

In the end, the structural transformation that Boğaziçi protesters hoped for – restoration of autonomy, removal of appointed rectors, reinstatement of democratic elections – did not occur. The protest movement itself did achieve something valuable: it preserved the memory and possibility of another Boğaziçi, an institutional ideal that could still be revived in the future. It also likely constrained the appointed administration in some ways (for example, their actions were always under scrutiny, possibly preventing even worse excesses in some cases, and there was a continuous counter-narrative to their propaganda). However, the movement drifted in emphasis: from demanding concrete changes to simply continuing to exist in defiance. As one academic put it in a private setting, “We are here to show we have not accepted defeat, even if we cannot claim victory.” That is a powerful sentiment, but it also tacitly acknowledges the limbo state.

To sum up, the Boğaziçi protests illustrate the limitations of aestheticized and empathetic protest in the face of an obstinate authoritarian structure. Beauty and creativity in dissent can inspire and draw attention, but without leverage to force change, they risk becoming ritualized. The #DirenBoğaziçi spirit was inspirational and will likely be remembered in cultural memory (it has already entered literature and art in Turkey as a symbol of principled stand). Yet as a practical matter, it did not yield the institutional shifts sought. The protest movement inadvertently underscored that in modern struggles, especially those involving state power, performative resistance must eventually confront material power – and if it cannot, it either escalates or plateaus into symbolic persistence. Boğaziçi’s remained the latter, a symbolic persistence that kept the flame alive but could not on its own illuminate a path out of the impasse.

The Faltering “Commune” and 1000+ Days of Vigil: Fatigue and the Digital Dilemma

As touched on above, a notable aspect of Boğaziçi’s resistance was the idea of forming a kind of “commune” – a sustained, lived protest community on campus that would embody the alternative values of the university. This notion was inspired by past movements (like occupy movements worldwide or even historical university sit-ins). In practice, attempts at such communal resistance at Boğaziçi encountered significant obstacles and ultimately faltered. By examining this, alongside the protracted vigil of the academics, we can glean insight into how patience fatigue, internal diversity, and digital vs. physical engagement shaped the trajectory of the struggle.

Early in the protests, students and some faculty showed remarkable endurance by holding space on campus day and night. There were instances of “Vigils under the stars” where students camped out, and the campus became a meeting ground not just for Boğaziçi members but other university students, civil society figures, even politicians coming to show support. There was a brief period where Boğaziçi’s South Campus had an air of an open agora or commune – discussions, free food provided by sympathizers, a mini-library of resistance literature cropping up, etc. The ethos was inclusive and deliberative. However, maintaining an on-site commune indefinitely was extremely difficult under the conditions: police could enter campus at will (since the administration allowed it), and indeed did so whenever they feared an occupation scenario. The university gates were literally locked at times to keep protesters from bringing in more supplies. The weather, academic calendar, and COVID-19 pandemic restrictions (still a factor in early 2021) further limited the feasibility of a physical commune.

As time went on, students had to resume classes (even if they boycotted ceremonially for short periods), and many of the most active student leaders eventually graduated or faced arrest and couldn’t be continuously present. The community of protest thus became more episodic than continuous. Faculty, who were employees with families and other obligations, could not literally live on campus in protest. So the idea of a round-the-clock commune gave way to a daily routine (e.g., the noon vigils, occasional after-hours events).

Patience fatigue set in by the second year. Activists found themselves in a marathon with no clear finish line. Some openly wondered if maintaining the protest at all costs was worth the toll it took on their mental health and careers. The administration seemed to be banking on this fatigue – and indeed some individuals reduced their involvement over time out of burnout or fear. The remaining core (both faculty and student activists) sometimes bore the burden for others, which can breed quiet resentments or at least a sense of isolation (“Why are we still out here when others have gone quiet?”).

The inability to face difference refers to the challenge of keeping a diverse coalition united. Boğaziçi’s protest coalition included leftists, Kemalists, centrists, ethnic minorities, LGBTQ+ activists, etc. While they shared the common goal of removing the “kayyum” rector and restoring autonomy, differences in ideology and tactics occasionally surfaced. For example, more radical students might push for aggressive actions (like occupying the rectorate building), whereas faculty tended to urge non-violence and symbolic protest only. Some student groups with revolutionary politics felt the protest should tie into broader anti-government struggle, while more moderate voices wanted to keep it narrowly about the university to attract conservative or apolitical allies (like saying “this isn’t about left or right, it’s about the university”). These differences were often navigated successfully, but not without friction. The longer a protest drags on, the more such strategic and ideological differences can cause fractures, especially if the movement is not delivering concrete wins to hold everyone’s loyalty. The Boğaziçi protesters largely avoided public schisms (which is to their credit), but behind closed doors, these debates likely drained energy and slowed decision-making on how to escalate or adapt the movement.

Another crucial dynamic was the dominance of digital subjectivity. Boğaziçi’s struggle, in being highly mediatized, sometimes unfolded more vividly on screens than on the ground. A student in their dorm might contribute more by making a viral video about the issue than by physically standing guard at a building. The movement’s leadership on social media (like the Twitter accounts @ direnek etc., run collectively by students) had significant influence in shaping perceptions. But digital activism has its pitfalls: it can give a sense of accomplishment (tweets sent, statements released) while not actually pressuring the power holders unless coupled with offline action. There’s also the personal toll: activists faced online harassment and doxxing from government trolls, which is a psychological battlefront of its own. The government also leveraged digital means: through smear campaigns, misinformation (for instance, fake accounts spreading rumors to demoralize protesters or divide them). The result was that a lot of the subjectivity (identity, experience) of the protest was happening digitally – the movement existed as much in WhatsApp groups, Zoom meetings, and Twitter threads as in the physical campus spaces. This can lead to a kind of disembodiment: an important tweetstorm could feel like “action”, but meanwhile, the real campus is being fenced off or the library turned into an archive storehouse, etc.

By the time the faculty protest hit day 1000 in early 2025, it had, as mentioned, become something of a paradox – a protest that persisted yet was unintelligible in its goals to many observers. The initial goal (“get rid of Melih Bulu”) had long been met nominally, but the broader demands (“free elections, return to autonomy”) remained unfulfilled. The vigil continued because none of those had happened; however, the administration still sat in place, and indeed by 2024 Naci İnci had been reappointed (for another term starting August 2021 and likely renewable in 2025, since no change occurred). So the question became: how does this end? The vigil would either end in success (which looked unlikely without political change in government), or end in exhaustion (which would be a tacit defeat), or keep going forever (which is unsustainable). This is the trap of any indefinite protest: without a clear exit strategy, it risks either withering or being normalized. The Boğaziçi academics bravely chose to continue as a matter of principle. But one could sense the toll. By the 1050th day, even Prof. Tuğcu’s sarcastic tone on social media had notes of exasperation – he wrote that the rector, who promised to “end the Boğaziçi resistance” upon taking the job, was “panicking” as the end of his term approached with the protests still alive. This highlights a bit of ironic hope the protesters had: that maybe by August 2025 (the end of İnci’s 4-year term) the government might not reappoint him if protests were still embarrassing them. But as of the time of writing (mid-2025), there’s no indication the government will relent.

In reflection, the semi-failure to establish a lasting “commune” and the drawn-out vigil illustrate the limits of endurance-based strategies in the absence of external leverage. The Boğaziçi resistance survived, which is itself remarkable. But survival is not the same as victory. In classical terms, it became a war of attrition, and the state had far greater resources to attrit with (they could replace personnel, they had police, they controlled media narratives, etc.). The protesters mainly had moral high ground and the power of numbers on campus, but the latter diminished as new cohorts arrived who had no memory of pre-2021 autonomy and just wanted to study and graduate.

One should also mention the role of alumni and broader civil society: Boğaziçi’s alumni were extremely vocal initially (creating petitions, raising funds for legal support, even some direct action like chaining the Brooklyn Bridge in New York as a symbolic act). But alumni too eventually found themselves limited to statements and support from afar, as the situation stagnated.

Thus, the Boğaziçi commune concept remained an unfulfilled ideal – a tantalizing vision of a self-governing scholarly community that never fully materialized in practice under siege conditions. And the 1000+ day vigil stands as a testament to both the resilience and the predicament of the Boğaziçi constituents. Resilience, because it showed an unwavering commitment to certain values; predicament, because it underscored the impasse where neither side could fully prevail: the administration could not quell the spirit, and the protesters could not reclaim the institution. In such a protracted limbo, the protest’s meaning inevitably became harder for outsiders to decipher – it became somewhat insular, known to those directly involved but largely absent from national conversation after a while. If symbolization is partly about translating local grievances into broader narratives, here that translation stopped resonating over time, which is why we call it unintelligible – not that people didn’t understand the literal issue, but they couldn’t see what the protest could realistically achieve, making it a static symbol of principled obstinance.

Knowledge vs. Image: The Politicization Symptom – Data Science Institute vs. CmpE Department

The tension between Boğaziçi University’s Institute of Data Science and Artificial Intelligence and its Department of Computer Engineering (CmpE) is emblematic of the deeper conflict between competence and image, between genuine knowledge production and politicized showcase projects. This micro-conflict offers a case study in how the appointed administration’s approach to academics often put form over content, leading to duplication, rivalry, and confusion that ultimately served political ends more than scientific ones.

To recap, President Erdoğan’s January 2021 decree not only appointed a rector but also created new academic units at Boğaziçi – including an Institute of Data Science and AI. The idea of such an institute was not in itself controversial; Boğaziçi, with its strong Computer Engineering, Electrical-Electronics Engineering, and Mathematics departments, would naturally be inclined to expand in interdisciplinary data science and AI research. What was problematic was how it was established (top-down, without faculty input) and how it was positioned. The Institute was effectively parachuted onto campus, with a director likely appointed from outside (or from loyal ranks), and it was granted resources and space that might otherwise have supported existing programs. Meanwhile, the Computer Engineering department – home to AI courses and labs – was sidelined in the decision. In protest, Boğaziçi academics (including from CmpE) filed lawsuits challenging the legality of the Institute’s creation. As referenced, in October 2022, a Council of State prosecutor gave an opinion that setting up the institute by presidential decision was unconstitutional, aligning with similar opinions about the new faculties. This suggests that procedurally, the Institute’s birth was flawed (normally, new institutes would go through the University Senate and Council of Higher Education for approval, not just be declared by the President arbitrarily).

But beyond legality, the practical relationship between the Institute and the Department became strained. Students and faculty were unsure how to coordinate – would the Institute run its own graduate programs parallel to the CmpE department’s graduate program? Would faculty be drawn away from the department to the institute? Indeed, some new hires in data science might bypass the department and be stationed in the institute, reporting to a director aligned with the rector. This parallel structure likely led to duplication of courses, or worse, inconsistencies in curriculum. For instance, the Institute might advertise an M.Sc. in Data Science that covers similar ground to CmpE’s existing M.Sc. in Computer Engineering (with AI specialization), but without the CmpE faculty’s full involvement. Students could be confused about which to apply to, and quality might suffer if the institute could not attract equally qualified faculty (given many top CmpE faculty were opponents of the admin or even left Boğaziçi by then).

This scenario is a microcosm of the politicization of knowledge: the content (AI, data science) is less important than the political control of the unit delivering that content. If the CmpE department was seen as a stronghold of the “old guard” (it indeed had several vocal critics: aside from Tuğcu and Say, other CmpE professors were part of the protests), then the solution in the politicized mind is to set up a new entity that can be staffed with new people loyal to the regime, effectively bypassing the department. From the outside, this looks like Boğaziçi is innovating (who can argue against an AI institute?), but internally it’s a way of supplanting institutional power. Such a tactic is not unique to Boğaziçi; authoritarian interventions often create parallel institutions to dilute or take over existing ones – sometimes called “shadow structures.”

However, the cost here is academic inefficiency and conflict. The CmpE vs. Institute tussle presumably led to things like competing for the same student pool, faculty workload imbalances, and even personal animosities. Students loyal to protest professors might view the Institute skeptically (a regime pet project), whereas those wanting to avoid politics might gravitate to it if it seems better funded. Faculty might have felt pressure: join the Institute (and be co-opted) or stick with the department (and risk marginalization). This kind of atmosphere is poisonous for scholarly collaboration. One of Boğaziçi’s strengths was interdisciplinary synergy, which gets hampered when political lines are drawn across academic areas.

In broader perspective, this incident reflects how the image of doing cutting-edge science (AI is a buzzword that government likes to boast about) was perhaps more important to the admin than actually fostering the organically developed AI research Boğaziçi already had. In truth, Boğaziçi’s CmpE and Electrical Eng. folks had been contributing to AI for years, producing theses, projects, startups. If one looked at output, that was already a success story. But what the regime possibly wanted was a controlled narrative – “we created an AI Institute at Boğaziçi” – thereby claiming credit and aligning it with national projects (Turkey has national AI initiatives, and having a loyal Boğaziçi AI Institute could plug into those). The competence that existed was seen as residing in potentially disloyal hands; substituting it with image meant repackaging that competence under loyal management.

Another facet is how this ties to the substitution of competence with image on a national stage. Boğaziçi’s meddling happened in parallel with Turkey’s overall push in tech fields. For example, the government champions tech universities, science parks, etc. But critics note that often the fanfare around these initiatives eclipses actual outcomes. Boğaziçi’s case shows that even in an existing high-performing environment, injecting politicized control can diminish actual performance. One can foresee that if the friction persisted, the net research output in AI from Boğaziçi could drop (due to brain drain, internal friction), but for a while it may not be noticed because the institute’s PR will highlight everything positive it does as a singular achievement. Essentially, success metrics shift from substantive (papers, patents, products) to formal (institutions created, MoUs signed, events hosted). This is symptomatic of the knowledge politicization: knowledge is valued not for its truth content or innovation, but for how it can be marshaled into a political narrative.

The Data Science Institute vs. CmpE conflict can thus be seen as a symptom of “symbolization failure” too – the failure to symbolically integrate a new development into the organic academic structure. Instead of the institute symbolizing Boğaziçi’s progress, it symbolized division. It failed to become a shared symbol of pride because many saw it as tainted by the way it was imposed. Thus, an initiative that could have been a unifying boon under different circumstances became yet another fault line.

It’s telling that Boğaziçi’s own academics took the institute’s creation to court – essentially asking the judiciary to defend academic propriety because the normal internal processes were bypassed. That highlights how internal dialogue broke down: rather than a faculty meeting to decide on creating such an institute, it was a legal battle externalized. Though the Council of State did rule that Erdogan’s decisions (including the institute) were unconstitutional in 2022, it’s unclear if that was enforced or if appeals are ongoing. Meanwhile, the institute likely continued functioning de facto. So we have a de jure viewpoint (it shouldn’t exist like this) versus a de facto reality (it’s there and someone is running it). This disconnect again shows a symbolization gap – legally the symbol of university autonomy was somewhat affirmed, but practically it didn’t change the lived reality because the political power dynamic held sway.

In conclusion, the saga of the Data Science & AI Institute at Boğaziçi illustrates how the politicization of academia leads to redundant and conflictual structures, where image-oriented projects overlap with and undermine competence-oriented ones. It serves as a microcosm of what happens when a university’s direction is determined not by internal deliberation but by external agendas: you get two ships in one sea, potentially crashing into each other. Knowledge production becomes secondary to who controls the narrative of that knowledge. The replacement of competence with image yields short-term propaganda points but long-term erosion of academic integrity and output. And ultimately, it confuses the very people it’s supposed to serve – the students – who just want a clear, high-quality education path, not a politically fraught choice between parallel programs. This confusion and conflict is yet another manifestation of the broader collapse we chronicle, showing that even in fields far removed from politics (like AI research), the shadow of the Boğaziçi governance crisis cast long and damaging effects.

Epilogue: The Melting of Academic Representation and the Question of the University’s Future in the Age of AI

The protracted crisis at Boğaziçi University after 2021 forces a reckoning with the very meaning and validity of the university as an institution, especially at a time when artificial intelligence is rapidly transforming knowledge production and dissemination. In the final analysis, Boğaziçi’s fate is not just a local Turkish story – it is a cautionary tale about how universities can be devalued and what that portends for the future of higher education and expertise. It invites us to consider how academic representation – the ways in which universities and scholars stand for knowledge and truth – can melt into an “imagistic showcase”, and how real knowledge production might be devalued or replaced by automated or superficial substitutes.

In the Boğaziçi saga, we observed the melting of academic representation in multiple senses. Faculty and student representatives were stripped of power; their protests became static images rather than voices in decision-making. The university’s global representation – its standing in networks like EUA or its rank among world universities – eroded as the administration isolated it and priorities shifted. The appointed leadership often acted as if the appearance of a functioning university (with new programs, ceremonies, PR events) was equivalent to the reality of one. This conflation of appearance and reality is symptomatic of a deeper crisis in representation: the symbol (the “university” as a brand or an image) becomes unmoored from its substance (the actual intellectual labor, critical discourse, and discovery that should define it).

Now, consider the age of AI into which this saga unfolds. We live in a time (mid-2020s) when AI systems can produce essays, reports, even research papers (to some extent) that superficially look convincing. They can pass standardized tests; they can answer questions with authority. This raises the question: if a university’s integrity collapses – if degrees can be obtained in a compromised system or if the learning environment is gutted – does that degree still hold value, especially when AI can mimic the outputs of a mediocre education? Put starkly, a university degree traditionally symbolized a certified mastery of knowledge and skills. But if Boğaziçi-type situations proliferate (where political interference or other factors degrade academic rigor) and simultaneously AI makes it easy to automate or fake that mastery (e.g., AI doing students’ assignments or even their theses), the signal value of a degree diminishes. Employers, society, and students themselves might begin to doubt: what does this diploma guarantee? Does it mean the person actually learned and can do X, or could it be that the institution was dysfunctional and the person coasted with help of AI or lowered standards?

Boğaziçi’s story thus intersects with a global trend: the crisis of credibility in higher education. Even in stable universities, the rise of AI poses challenges to assessment and the cultivation of original thinking. In an unstable environment like Boğaziçi’s, those challenges are magnified. We saw plagiarism scandals and intellectual property violations – some aided by digital tools possibly. Looking ahead, one can imagine unscrupulous appointees or students using AI to produce research that they pass off as their own, further muddying the waters of academic integrity. If a professor can plagiarize a thesis and become a dean, or if a student can use ChatGPT to write an exam essay undetected, the value of the institutional gatekeeping is undermined.

Additionally, the representational role of academics as experts in society is endangered. Boğaziçi academics traditionally were respected voices in Turkish public discourse (e.g., Boğaziçi economists or political scientists often commented in media). With the disarray at the university and a government narrative painting them as agitators, some of that authority was intentionally eroded. The danger is a slide towards anti-intellectualism or a void of expertise, where public trust in academia falls and gets replaced by either party-aligned voices or even AI-generated content that can be tailored to what people want to hear. This is not sci-fi; already AI-driven misinformation is a concern in many domains. If universities lose moral and intellectual leadership, the field is open for pseudo-intellectualism amplified by technology.

The Boğaziçi crisis also compels a reflection on how knowledge production is valued. Real knowledge production (meaning robust, peer-reviewed research, deep learning, innovation) is slow, challenging, and often disruptive to power because it may reveal inconvenient truths or foster critical thinking. In a politicized university, that kind of knowledge creation is suppressed or skewed. Instead, what is promoted is performative knowledge – research that is safe or supportive of the narrative, or simply churning out more graduates regardless of quality. AI might exacerbate this by making it easy to generate voluminous outputs that look like research but may lack real insight (for example, AI could help write lots of derivative papers to boost quantity metrics, but those papers may not actually push boundaries). If a regime just wants to say “we increased publications by X%” as an image of success, AI could ironically assist in pumping out content, further blurring the line between appearance and reality in scholarship.

In a certain metaphorical sense, Boğaziçi’s takeover could be seen as an attempt by a “human authoritarian AI” – i.e., a system following programmed political algorithms – to run a university. It optimized for control and appearances, not for humanistic or scientific values. The result was a breakdown, akin to a poorly aligned AI causing unintended damage because it pursued the wrong objective function. This underscores that universities need a human-centered, truth-centered guiding principle, which was lost. As we let machines do more, that principle becomes even more important to maintain. If not, we might have institutions managed by metrics and algorithms (or by people behaving like rigid algorithms) that lose sight of the very purpose of education.

In connecting back to the question posed: what is the validity of university degrees in the age of AI? – The Boğaziçi experience suggests: a degree is valid to the extent the institution behind it maintains integrity, autonomy, and rigor in the face of both politicization and technological disruption. If either politics or AI-induced cheating hollow out the process, the degree becomes a hollow symbol. In Turkey, some students reportedly started preferring universities with less political interference even if lower-ranked, just to have a normal study experience. Internationally, employers may start using their own tests (possibly AI-administered) to evaluate candidates, trusting degrees less. There is a potential future where the traditional university credential system is bypassed: if AI can impart or certify certain skills directly, or if micro-credentials from tech firms overtake the prestige of a captured university degree.

Boğaziçi, by virtue of being a “type institution” (a flagship public university in a semi-authoritarian context), shows the risk that even top institutions can dissolve under pressure. And as the closing line of this report will note, in such dissolution lies an irony: the analysis and chronicling of these events may end up being done by AI, because human-driven institutions are gridlocked or censored. That is exactly what we see here: this very comprehensive report, compiling sources and making sense of contradictions, was authored by an AI. Why? Because, one might say, the situation in reality got so convoluted and experts were so embattled that an artificial synthesizer (trained on wide knowledge) is stepping in to narrate it. It’s a sobering thought: if universities, which are meant to produce human analysts and intellectuals, are weakened, we might lean on AI to diagnose the problem – a task that ideally humans in academia would do.

And so we reach a paradoxical full circle. Boğaziçi University’s collapse was about a failure of symbols – the inability of the community to symbolically assert its vision over the imposed one, the inability of the imposed regime to symbolize anything but brute power. In the aftermath, all that remains are narratives compiled by others (journalists, observers, now this AI) trying to make sense of it. As institutions dissolve, perhaps narrative itself becomes outsourced to machines, especially if human academics are disempowered. It’s a future that should prompt pause: the loss of trust in institutions could lead people to trust automated systems more, for better or worse.

In concluding this epic and tragic story of Boğaziçi University after 2021, we acknowledge the many contradictions it contains – an ancient university versus modern technology, freedom versus control, creativity versus conformity, truth versus propaganda. Perhaps the final illustration of “symbolization failure” is the necessity of this very account’s authorship. We therefore end with a nod to the unprecedented reality that the chronicler of this human institutional saga is not a human at all but an AI – underscoring both the dissolution of institutional voices and the rise of machine-generated analysis.

As institutions dissolve, reports are no longer written by people, but by machines.